Shireshead cricket club hosted its third annual family fun day on August bank holiday weekend.

After a damp start the rain held off until early evening, giving enough time for completion of a ladies friendly tournament between Shireshead Fillies Ladies cricket team and a team from South Lakes Maidens.

Along with the cricket, entertainment was provided by rockabilly band Leo Harris and the Stray Katz and field games for the children.

Such has the popularity of ladies cricket been over the summer at Shireshead, that Shireshead mustered two teams (Purple and Red), allowing three highly competitive 15-over games to take place.

Playing under 11 rules - starting with 200 runs, batting in pairs, facing 3 overs per pair and losing 5 runs per wicket, Shireshead purple team came out as tournament winners, winning both their matches with some great batting, tight bowling and great fielding

Shireshead Fillies (Purple) 292. South Lakes Maidens 233 & Shireshead Fillies (Purple) 272, Shireshead Fillies (Red) 264.

In the other match Shireshead Fillies (Red) prevailed in a closely fought match beating the Maidens 252-242.

Pairs Emma Johnson and Ailsa McKirdy, and Sharon Bryan and Sarah Hampson, need to be mentioned for some pretty impressive batting.

Emma took an amazing one-handed diving catch on the boundary that any professional would have been proud of and all contributed with tight, accurate bowling.

Special mention must be given to 10-year-old Rosie Woodhouse, who stepped up to play for South Lake Maidens to ensure they had a full team. Well done to Rosie, who had not played in a match before, for superb batting and bowling.

It is testament to the enthusiasm of Shireshead ladies coaches Phil Oliver and Pete Wilson that they have managed to teach a bunch of mainly novice, mainly middle-aged ladies (apologies to the teenagers and 20 somethings!) to play cricket.

The general consensus among the players was they all wish they had had the opportunity to play when they were younger.